When Wildwood United Methodist senior pastor Michael Beck took the door off the hinges in his office and placed it in the church sanctuary, church members knew he was onto a different type of evangelism. That evangelism is called Fresh Expressions.

Fresh Expressions is an innovative worldwide movement in which members create new forms of church alongside existing congregations in order to make contact with an ever-changing world. Fresh Expressions involves members meeting people in coffee shops, bars, restaurants, parks, and other public venues as a way to bring the Lord to others.

The Episcopal Church, including here in Central Florida, has been immersed in Fresh Expressions for some time now. Scheduled to share some of the good news and generate interest in Fresh Expressions is The Church of St. Luke & St. Peter in St. Cloud, which will host a Vision Day from 9:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m., Saturday, Dec. 1.

Beck, who has achieved enormous success with Fresh Expressions at his church, will be the guest speaker at the one-day training event. Participants will learn about how the Church exists in new ways from Fresh Expressions instructors and gain insight into revitalizing their congregations through this form of Church, as well as learn what kind of impact it can have on their community.

“When they have the taste of grace, the community comes together to eat,” Beck said in a YouTube video that grabbed the attention of his friend, Father Jon Davis, who works in the Fresh Expressions movement at St. Luke & St. Peter. “I took the door off my office, off the hinges, and put that in the sanctuary. And I just let know the congregation know that I’m not going to be in that office.

“This guy, John Wesley (founder of the Methodist Movement), he said this thing, ‘The world is my parish,’ so I let them know that I would be doing that,” Beck said. “But I would go out in the community and that would be my office, connecting with people, being in their spaces, building relationships.”

At Wildwood United Methodist, getting people to accept Fresh Expressions was a challenge since some of the congregation comes from an older generation that believed in attending church on a weekly basis.

“To be honest, when he first started talking about Fresh Expressions, we were very skeptical and felt he was ignoring the needs of the older parishioners who because of their loyalty to the church they deserved his time and attention, said Wildwood UMC member Cindi Gillis, “and you know at a certain point it was very interesting to us that the Holy Spirit kind of took over.”

Beck said his goal was to combine the two aspects of his congregation and work from there. “My goal was to navigate those two worlds of taking care of the folks, the saints, who have been holding this church together and at the same time do things in the community,” he said. “We got some folks willing that experienced the Vision Day and had caught kind of a vision for this. We brought them to a pioneer learning community, so they got actually immersive training in these concepts and do’s and don’ts.  And then we just started to encourage people to find their passion, your hobby, let’s start talking about how that could become a Fresh Expression. And one after another we started to explore ideas.”

And Fresh Expressions doesn’t require a unique skill set; just one of informing others of the good news of the Lord.

“We were encouraging them and letting them know that they don’t have to be a professional minister, that God has called them you know just right where they are,” said Krista Spagnola, associate pastor of Wildwood UMC. “They were able to start up these smaller communities inside their own community.”

In Wildwood, Fresh Expressions movements can be seen at a tattoo parlor, Mexican restaurant and even the park. St. Luke & St. Peter Church hopes to experience that same kind of success.

“We are kind of planting green spaces throughout our community,” Beck said. “We would call them Fresh Expressions. We also have to take care of the inherited, what I like to call “The Tree.” So, there’s that inherited tree that’s been there for a long time and it lives through the desert of decline and post-Christendom, so when we’re grafted together in this way, we’re seeing this new kind of vineyard emerge and our church is no longer really defined about just the root stock, just the tree. But now people in our community experience us in all these different ways.”

Schedule for the event is as follows:

9 a.m.: Gathering time – coffee and refreshments

9:30 a.m.: Welcome and worship

10 a.m.: Session No. 1 – Movement: How Fresh Expressions Is Changing the Landscape

10:45 a.m.: Break

11 a. m.: Session No. 2 – Need: Why Fresh Expressions Matter for the Church

Noon: Lunch break

12:45 p.m.: Session No. 3 – Form: Creating Fresh Expressions in Context

2 p.m.: Break

2:15 p.m.: Local story interview and Q&A

2:50 p.m.: Session No. 4 – Action: How it’s Happening and How You Can Get Involved

3:30 p.m.: Closing

To register for Vision Day, please access the following link:

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/vision-day-st-cloud-tickets-49287615585